


Broken Together

by Death_By_A_Thousand_Cuts



Category: Glee
Genre: Angst, Communication, Disordered Eating (?), Hurt/Comfort, Spoilers for Episode 5x16, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, references to past homophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-09 03:47:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 7,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27344560
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Death_By_A_Thousand_Cuts/pseuds/Death_By_A_Thousand_Cuts
Summary: My take on episodes 5x15/5x16 (Bash/Tested). I dove into both Kurt and Blaine's minds and tried to make sense of what they were thinking and going through, and rewrote the ending in a way I thought captured their relationship. Basically my interpretations of their relationship and what should've happened in the episode.
Relationships: Blaine Anderson/Kurt Hummel
Comments: 5
Kudos: 25





	1. Chapter 1

_The hospital lights are bright as the two adults hurry down the hall. Fluorescent bulbs paint shadows across too clean walls, and highlight every wrinkle of worry on the faces in an unflattering white light. The click of hard heels echoes as the reception desk comes closer and closer._

_The people themselves are clearly well-off, dressed in expensive looking coats and expressions of perpetual contempt. Smooth black hair is neatly parted and neatly combed, pulled back in a low bun for the woman and tightly gelled for the man. Shoes are polished an almost feverish amount, shiny enough the reflections of the people wearing them stare back, wavy and distorted on the hard leather. They’re wearing all black, black coats, black scarves, black hats. Like it’s a funeral, not a hospital._

_In some ways, it’s the same._

_“We’re here for our son.”_

_“You must be Mr. and Mrs. Anderson. Follow me, Blaine is just down this hallway.”_

_The receptionist is young, pretty even as she leads the Andersons down yet another still hall. The morose atmosphere seems to be sucking the life right out of her, and by the quiet dejectedness in her voice she’s realized it too. The three of them hurry quickly, the couple in the back almost faster than the receptionist, desperate to reach the room where they can see their son._

_The trio stops at a nondescript door, white, closed, and still, like the rest of the doors they’ve passed._

_“He’s in here”, the receptionist says softly. “He’s okay”, she says even softer._

_“Okay?!” Shrieks Mrs. Anderson. “Just okay?! That’s all you have to say about him?”_

_“He’s okay”._

_A hand reaches out to open the door, but pulls away quickly. “We need to discuss legal action first.”_

_“ . . . legal action?”_

_“Mr. Anderson, this was a hate crime.”_

_“But he’s okay, right?”_

_There’s a pause, one that seems to stretch on much longer than silence is supposed to._

_“He’s okay.”_

_“So then that’s settled, right? Why would we need legal action?”_

_Another pause, almost longer this time. The receptionist stares dully at the man in front of her._

_“We don’t want to make a big deal out of this. There are many things our family wants to be known for, and this isn’t one of them.”_

_And so the door is opened, and the Andersons rush inside quickly, expressions of worry turning to expressions of love as the curtain around a bed is swept open._

_And there he lays, pale and still, a dark constellation of bruises decorating broken skin. Mr. and Mrs. Anderson crowd around, staring at the boy. Taking in his beaten body, hidden under hospital blankets that smell too much like rubbing alcohol. Looking for those warm hazel eyes . . . except they’re not hazel. They’re blue. And then they’re taking in the stitches, the blood, the pale blue-grey eyes that once were so bright, now dimming and dimming until the last breath is exhaled through bloody lips, until the last light goes out in those blue eyes, until Kurt's body goes limp and lifeless, his skin finally the same color as the porcelain he was nicknamed after, and just as cold._

__

* * *

Blaine wakes with a start, little beads of sweat stinging his shirt. His heart is a steady pounding in his chest, and his throat feels too dry, too ashy. Out of habit he checks, and yes, Kurt is still there, sleeping peacefully next to him, almost a picture perfect replica of the Kurt Blaine saw in his dream. And he’s so still, so quiet, so unmoving, that it takes every bone in his body to stop him from reaching over and waking Kurt up just to make sure he really still is alive. But Kurt has been getting barely any sleep lately, and Blaine has been working on being less clingy, so instead he focuses on the things he can know for a fact: that Kurt’s chest keeps gently rising and falling, that his fingers gently twitch once in a while, and that he can hear the gentle exhaling of Kurt’s breathing. People don’t do that if they’re dead, Blaine knows. Kurt’s alive. And so he tries to go back to sleep.

But sleep can’t come when he’s haunted with pictures of Kurt in that hospital bed. Blaine’s hospital bed. The hospital bed _Blaine_ was supposed be lying in in that dream. And it feels like his subconscious is mocking him, reminding him of another hospital bed he should’ve been in instead of Kurt. A different bed, in a different hospital, in a different city, yet so similar.

Because like in his dream, Kurt shouldn’t have been there. He shouldn’t have been lying on bloody sheets. It should have been Blaine in his place, Blaine who had gotten beaten up by those men, Blaine who had sworn and promised to protect Kurt, Blaine who had swooped in and saved Kurt when he was in high school yet couldn’t do it once he was an adult. Blaine who’d failed.

And just like that he’s fourteen and scared again, helpless against the hate that rages on, unable to do anything but stand by and watch as people get hurt. Unable to be the hero he needs himself to be. And then he’s fifteen again, sweeping Kurt off his feet with a bravado and charm that disappears the second Kurt sees through him, playing the hero and ignoring the fact that he too is just a scared kid overcompensating for everything. And then he’s sixteen, learning for the first time just how addicting love can be, but not yet learning how dangerous it is to put your whole heart, your whole soul, your whole life into one very young, very human person. And then lo and behold he’s seventeen and so fucking stupid, learning that actions have consequences, and struggling with the knowledge that in his desperate need to feel . . . just _wanted_ , he ruined the one thing he was living for. And this time, it was all on him. And then he’s eighteen and still hasn’t been knocked into reality yet, planning a fairytale proposal like it’s a romantic gesture instead of a desperate attempt of proving he’s still worth something. Because if he gets Kurt back, then everything will be fine. It has to be.

And now he’s nineteen, and it’s not perfect. He has everything, the college of his dreams, a house shared with his best friend, a fiancé who loves him, and yet he’s still not happy. Everything in his life, every heartache and downwards spiral, had all boiled down to that one question. Was he really the hero he tries to be? And with that phone call, telling him that Kurt was in the hospital, that he failed to protect him, he finally got his answer.

He wasn’t. Not even close.


	2. Chapter 2

Kurt wakes to the sound of gentle singing drifting in through the curtains. As reluctant as he was at first to let Blaine stay over so much after the incident - the doctors had let him go for a reason goddammit, he didn’t need to be coddled - he had to admit he missed it. Waking up to a home cooked breakfast his fiancé had made just for him, falling asleep to the gentle rhythm of a second heartbeat next to his . . . yeah, he could get used to this.

Padding silently into the kitchen, Kurt watched for a few seconds as Blaine spun around the kitchen, absorbed in his singing. With his loose curls and homely apron - a frilly teal thing Kurt had bought him as a joke and he had insisted on wearing - Blaine was every bit the picture of quiet domestic life. Blaine was sunny walks through the flowering trees of Greenwood Cemetery. Blaine was Ample Hills ice cream dripping on to the salty cobblestones down in Red Hook. Blaine was rainy picnics in the gazebo by the waterfall on Prospect Park Lake. Blaine was . . . home.

The song he was singing, a sweet Taylor Swift ode to love at first sight, brought Kurt back to their first meeting so many years ago.

_“This night is sparkling, don't you let it go”_ , Blaine sings in Kurt’s kitchen, “ _I'm wonder struck, blushing all the way home”._

And just like that he’s sixteen and starstruck again, watching the handsome stranger dancing about and letting his imagination run wild with fantasies about Disney Prince’s and first kisses that actually sparkle. And then he’s seventeen, caught up in a fairytale, with the perfect boyfriend and the perfect glee club and the perfect senior year, not yet ready for everything to change. And wow he’s an adult now, and it turns out the people you love most in the world are the one’s who can hurt you the most, who with just four words can shatter every bridge you’ve tentatively built and rebuild every wall you’ve been trying to knock down. And then he’s nineteen and once again swept away with the idea of true love and soulmates, but this time more cautiously, with a maturity and depth he never had the first time he saw Blaine sing, a maturity that changes everything and makes it all more real and dangerous.

And now he’s twenty and Blaine is sweeping him into his arms and dancing him around the room, as Kurt joins in with the singing, not even caring that the food is getting cold. Because for a moment, being held like that by Blaine, he almost forgets about the nightmares and the fear, almost forgets how the one place he thought was safe was the one place that almost broke him, almost forgets how Blaine cries in the shower every day and how everyone keeps looking at Kurt like he’s a small child who needs help.

Almost forgets, but not quite.

By the time Blaine stops singing and starts serving the food, Kurt’s heart is heavy with the remembrance of past years. “Do you ever wish we could go back to when we were young?” He wonders, Blaine’s face unreadable.

“We’re young now.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Yes. All the time.” His voice is soft, his hands still.

Kurt’s struck by it then, the realization of how finite the time they have left is. Who knows when a car might swerve the wrong way, when a tree branch might fall at the wrong time? Who knows how much seconds either of them really have left on this planet? Not in a million years did Kurt have expected to get beaten up like he did, and yet it happened. What was the likelihood he wouldn’t have woken up? What was the likelihood the same thing might happen to Blaine tomorrow? Likelier then he thought, Kurt realizes. Their own mortality was unpredictable, and Kurt hated unpredictable things. He like order, control. He hated the idea that today could be the last time he ever saw Blaine again, and he’d have no idea.

“I love you”, Kurt said, urgently and aggressively, the need to convey all that without actually saying it out loud overwhelming.

“I love you too.”

“No, I mean it. We have no idea what’s going to happen. For all I know, I could die tomorrow. You could die tomorrow. And if one of us does, I want you to honestly, truly, know how much I care about you.”

Blaine’s bemused expression quickly turns to worry. “Neither of us is going to die, Kurt. You have nothing to worry about. I promise.”

“That’s what I thought the morning it happened, and look, was I fine? No, I wasn’t.”

It was the wrong thing to say, and Kurt wishes he could take it back immediately. Blaine’s expressions fold inwards on themselves, and Kurt could feel him retreating. Desperate to change the subject, relieve the tension, Kurt turns to small talk.

“Did you sleep alright?”

“Yes, wonderfully.”

It’s a lie and Kurt can tell immediately. But he doesn’t press. He knows he wouldn’t want Blaine too.

There’s a heavy silence as they do the dishes together, but it’s comforting. Kurt likes silence. In the trash can he notices an empty box of cookies; it was full just the other day and Kurt hasn’t had any yet. He wonders briefly if he should question Blaine, it seems pretty unhealthy. But in the end, he doesn’t ask questions. Questions have answers, and answers aren’t always pretty.

And right now, not pretty is the last thing Kurt needs more of in his life.


	3. Chapter 3

Blaine never considered himself a jealous person. He liked attention, of course, but wouldn’t get upset when other people were getting more than him. That wasn’t who he was.

Until now. Because as much as he hated to admit it, he was jealous of Kurt. Really fucking jealous.

He felt horrible about it, he honestly did. He knew he should be proud of his fiancé and his newfound confidence, and he was proud, but also . . . jealous. What a spiteful word. What a spiteful feeling. He tried to shut it out, but Blaine’s never been good at hiding emotions and this was no exception. So he let the jealousy curl in the bottom of his stomach, an ugly feeling inside an ugly person. Ugly, ugly, ugly. That’s what he thought of himself. And that’s what shone right through.

Because his whole life Blaine relied on other people for validation. He relied on other people to like him so he didn’t have to like himself. He let himself sit in a pit of his own self-hatred, and let attention and validation build the ladder out of there.

He’d tried to explain all of this to Kurt before, but Kurt didn’t get it. “Why do you let other people determine how you feel about yourself? Isn’t it enough to just love yourself?” Kurt would ask, and each time Blaine didn’t have an answer. He would try to explain that he just _couldn’t_ , he wasn’t like Kurt, who was awesome and sexy and knew it, he couldn’t figure out how to think of himself like that unless someone explicitly told him he was. It sounded even more pathetic out loud than in his head, and eventually they both stopped trying to discuss it. Oh well.

And now everyone was finally realizing how amazing Kurt was. After years of being the underdog, his fiancé was . . . cool. Cooler than him. Because Kurt knew he was hot, and Blaine was starting to realize that’s what matters so much more than anything else. If you were confident, then that would rub off on other people. Blaine knew that; he himself used that back in high school. But like many things about his personality, his confidence was fake. Kurt’s was real and refreshing, a quiet air of authority that came with going through what he did. It was what had pulled Blaine towards him in the first place, and was what was pulling in the attention from everyone else now.

And as for Blaine, he had given up on pretending to be confident. He just let the world see him exactly as he saw himself, which was, in gauche terms, a pathetic loser.

It foolish now, Blaine realizes, to have expected everything to magically get better once he moved to NYC. He was convinced his issues had to be because of Ohio, because if they weren’t, that meant they were because of him. In his head. And that meant he would finally have to confront his insecurities and get his shit together, and honestly? That plan was a lot less appetizing than letting the city fix it all for him. So he knew, he just knew, that once he moved here with Kurt it’d all be good.

And it was at first. He saw the bright lights of Time Square, felt the dreams flutter like banners tied to a fire escape, like blue balloons on toddlers’ wrists, twisting, pulling, tugging towards the sky. And it was everything he imagined and more. But over time, the lights dimmed, and with it his hope that a new city and a fresh start would fix everything. And eventually he watched the banner get thrown away, fraying over time,

saw the balloon string snap, and the person, once so full of wishes, looking up from their janitors mop, from their cramped, tight apartments, from their sleeping bag and cardboard sign, a million hearts beating as one watching all that hope disappear.

And then the unspeakable became reality and Kurt was in the hospital, rejected, beaten by the one place they thought they could be safe. The one place they thought they could escape the homophobia, escape the hate, but it was all just a lie. And that day, holding Kurt’s hand on white sheets, Blaine looked out the window to find the city lights had dimmed completely.

So Blaine cries. He cries in the shower and he cries while eating his heart out at midnight. He cries for the beautiful city that really is ugly if you look close enough. He cries for the constellation of bruises that dusted Kurt’s skin, a million blue stars angrily spilled onto him by an overflow of hate. He cries for the fact he peaked in high school after spending the entirety of it waiting for college. And at night, he and Kurt cry together, neither saying anything because there’s too much emotion and not enough words to capture those feelings.

He cries because he knows someday Kurt is going to leave him. More than jealous, Blaine is terrified. Terrified that tomorrow will be the day Kurt comes to his senses and realizes he’s wasting his time with a high school sweetheart that isn’t sweet anymore. Because every day that passes, Kurt is growing more mature, and more grown up, and Blaine . . . isn’t.

Kurt had asked him if he ever wishes to go back in time, and he doesn’t realize how much Blaine does. Because everything was easier when they were kids, and Blaine could play the hero and save the day and not have to worry about holding Kurt back. He misses the simplicity of it, how neither of them had to worry about adult things and how much it’ll all change once you’re grown up, once the maturity is imbalanced and the love is imbalanced and the communication is screwed because the love of your life won’t talk to you and instead holds it all inside. Dear god how Blaine wishes he could go back to then.

But instead, he stays in the present. And which each day both the fear of Kurt leaving him and the inability to tell Kurt everything in his head gets stronger. And slowly Blaine realizes that maybe it won’t be the external pressure that ruins their relationship, it’ll be the internal pressure.

Because more addicting than food, more addicting than love, is silence.


	4. Chapter 4

When Kurt was very young, he learned the world would never truly accept him. It wasn’t a sudden realization, more of a conclusion slowly reached after years of dirty looks and even dirtier words thrown at him in hallways, on streets, online. And so, Kurt decided he didn’t need it to. Why would he want to be part of something that wanted him to change? All that mattered was that he accepted himself. All that mattered was that he had control over his own life.

Control. Kurt liked knowing what was happening, liked everything in order and making sense. He’d seen enough of the world to know that bad things happened when you weren’t careful. He’d seen his friends get pregnant, get cheated on, get their heart broken, get their lives flipped upside down because they let the world decide what happened next. And Kurt wasn’t like that. The world had been cruel to him, spitting on him and telling him he was worthless over and over again until no one’s opinions mattered accept for the one’s of those closest to his heart. No way was he letting fate determine what his path was, not when fate was dangerous and unpredictable. Not when he’d spent years building up walls closing himself off from anything and anyone that could hurt him, and he wasn’t about to let those crumble.

But then fate blew in in the form of an odd boy named Blaine, and for the first time in his life Kurt saw those walls fall. He saw himself become vulnerable, saw himself starting to believe that maybe not everything in life happens for a reason. And for the first time in his life, there was someone that made him want to let go and dive headfirst into the future. Someone that didn’t try to break his walls down, and instead waited patiently for Kurt to take them down himself. Someone who finally made Kurt want to.

Someone who had no control, and who let himself get carried away with emotions and songs and hopeful promises. Someone who swept Kurt along with him, introducing him into the freeing world of just _existing_ , and who made Kurt want to let go and get pulled right into this frenzied world of impulsive decisions and thinking later. But as much as Kurt wanted to dive headfirst, he couldn’t. There were too many years of burying his heart away, too many fears of the unknown to let himself give in. Maybe in the future Kurt could finally let the last of his walls fall, relinquish the last control he was desperately clinging too. Maybe then he could finally bear his entire soul to the person who taught him how.

But the problem with living life for the daydreams is that you never know what’s coming. And as it turn out, the dark haired boy that had rescued Kurt from his demons was wrestling with demons himself, and one day Kurt saw it all come crashing down. One confession put it all into perspective, that baring your soul to someone would lead to nothing but heartbreak. That it was so much easier to cage up his heart again than to melt the bars locking it away down. That after years of vulnerability and nights of delicate intimacy, Blaine had somehow managed to make a wreckage of the home Kurt had built for him inside his chest.

It took a while, but Kurt was able to let Blaine back in. Blaine still had the key to his heart, it’s just the lock was being guarded.And a new age started, an age of metal against his ring finger and of loving as an adult. But it wasn’t the same. Kurt could tell Blaine just wanted to go back to the way things were, but some wounds take time to heal. And time was the one thing they weren’t using. So Kurt let himself get swept away again, but this time he did it carefully. This time he controlled the raft that carried him and Blaine downstream. This time he didn’t make promises he couldn’t keep, and this time their love burned bright with city lights instead of small town sunrises.

And then Kurt was attacked. And that was the most unpredictable thing he could’ve imagined. And suddenly he didn’t have any control over his life. At all.

He just needed to feel in control again. He hated how the fate of his life had quite literally rested in the hands of other people. He hated how everyone kept trying to coddle him and tell him what to do in an almost obsequious way. He hate how after years of saying “fuck you” to all the homophobes they finally got to him. He hated it.

So Kurt found new ways to feel in control. He started exercising, watching what he ate. He might not be able to control of his life, but he could control his body. And that was enough. He had power over what he ate, how he looked. And he poured all the anger, all the fear, all the uncertainty into every push-up, every crunch, using it as an outlet for releasing all those emotions he kept inside.

And Blaine kept trying to get him to talk, to open up and discuss the attack. And Kurt just . . . couldn’t. Because saying it out loud, finally admitting what had happened, would mean it was real. It would mean he would finally have to acknowledge the lack of control he had, and Kurt couldn’t do that. No, he would much rather pretend nothing happened, and not have to face ugly truths. He would much rather bottle it all inside of him then let it out and end up admitting that he was scared, and confused, and lost.

So he let the silence consume them. And as Kurt pulled away emotionally, Blaine pulled away physically. Until they were intimate almost never, and for the love of God Kurt couldn’t tell why. Whatever was causing Blaine to pull away like this was beyond his comprehension, and it hurt. Because Kurt showed his love, Kurt showed his vulnerability, through sex. In his mind it was the highest form of intimacy, and truest way of showing someone you really were a part if them. So when Blaine stopped having sex with him, Kurt was losing the connection that reinforced their love, that reminded him that even with all this going on they still loved each other. And the gap between them got wider and wider, and Blaine never felt farther away.

Eventually Kurt tried one last time, setting out candles and a nice meal in a desperate attempt to set the mood. Or at least figure out where the issue was, where he was going wrong.

It was after dinner when they had receded to the bedroom, getting lost in each other’s mouths. It had been a while and the mood was rushed, the atmosphere heavy, as shirts came off and hands roamed.

“You’re gorgeous”, Kurt whispered, because _god_ he had missed this-

Blaine tenses up, an unreadable look flashing across his face. Kurt immediately stilled, racking his brain trying to find out what he said, where he went wrong.

“What’s- what did I-“

“No, no, it’s not you. It’s me, I’m sorry, I’ve just been so . . . you know . . . lately”

Kurt doesn’t know.

Blaine sighs, rolling over to face Kurt.

“I’m sorry about this. We could do something else? Maybe head up to the Garment District, shop at Mood Fabrics, I know it’s your favorite . . .”

Blaine’s rambling now, and something inside of Kurt is breaking. He wants to talk to Blaine, figure out what Blaine had assumed he’d known earlier, figure out what was causing all this. But he . . . can’t. He can’t bring himself to divert the conversation back to more serious topics, because that means uncomfortable questions he’s not sure he wants to hear the answer too. And he knows the conversation will twist back to him, and he can’t tell Blaine everything in his head without breaking. So instead, they lie there in silence.

Yet even the silence feels broken.


	5. Chapter 5

Blaine stares at himself in the mirror, slowly taking in his body. There’s an extra jiggle in his ass and thighs when he walks, and areas that used to be toned are soft. His stomach is rounder then it used to be, and muscle, which he can still feel, is hidden behind fat. He can’t help but notice his other imperfections too, things he’s never cared about but now embarrass him, all the little unattractive flaws in his body.

It’s gross, Blaine thinks. He’s gross.

He’d never felt worried about his body before. He never thought he was gorgeous by any means, but Blaine never thought he wasn’t, either. It was just . . . who he was. How he looked. But now, now he couldn’t help but examine it each night, checking for cellulite or scars or any other imperfections. Now he couldn’t help but wonder what it really meant to be attractive, to be ugly. Blaine hated a lot of things about himself, but before now, he’d never hated how he looked.

He hated how he couldn’t stop eating crap, even if it was causing him to be miserable. Because the food gave him the rush he wasn’t getting anywhere else, it made him feel happy and satisfied even when everything else in the world made him feel the opposite. And as much as he wanted to take responsibility, start dieting and fix his problems himself, he couldn’t bring himself to stop eating when it just made himself feel so good inside. So he let himself wallow in his self-pity, and let the cycle continue. And he let the world move on faster and faster, leaving him more and more behind with every passing rotation.

And that meant Kurt was leaving him behind too. But I guess that was what was always bound to happen. Because now Kurt was winning. Kurt was beating him. At what, Blaine was unsure. Popularity? Hotness? Or just life in general? Every passing day was starting to seem more and more like a test that Kurt was acing and Blaine had forgotten to study for. And the feelings disgusted him, because life isn’t a race. It isn’t a competition. Kurt wasn’t competition. They’d always been one unit, Kurt & Blaine. Kurt had always been everything he wasn’t, and he had been everything Kurt wasn’t, and together they completed each other, and together they were whole.

But that wasn’t how it was anymore. Because Kurt was still everything Blaine wasn’t, but Blaine was no longer everything Kurt wasn’t. The more that Blaine thought about it, the more he realized he was nothing Kurt wasn’t. He was . . . useless in this relationship. And if he’s realized it already pretty soon Kurt was going to realize it too, and then where would he be? Maybe they had been Kurt & Blaine in high school, but it was college and Kurt didn’t want to be half of a relationship. He wanted to be his own person, and Blaine was so proud of him for doing so, but that didn’t mean it didn’t hurt. Because if Kurt didn’t want to be Kurt & Blaine anymore, what did that mean for Blaine, who wasn’t anything except for Kurt’s other half? And if he wasn’t Kurt’s other half, then what was he?

Lost, that was the answer.

And maybe he hadn’t mean to stop being intimate with Kurt, but then again, maybe he had. Maybe it was time to admit he had a problem, and that he could no longer “deal with it himself” if it meant it was affecting the people around him. Maybe the fact that all it took was a few extra pounds for him to be unable to let his fiancé see him naked was indicative of a bigger issue, the magma under his mind that kept creating all these earthquakes.

But then again, maybe it wasn’t.

When it finally broke down, Blaine was almost relieved. So long of saying it was okay, he was okay, that it almost felt like a weight lifting off his shoulders now that Kurt had realized he wasn’t. And now he could sit Kurt down, and try to tell him all of this, and Kurt would say something that made him realize how stupid he was being and it would be okay if they just _talked_ about all of this.

But Kurt wasn’t interested in talking. And he kept shutting Blaine down every time he tried. And it was _infuriating,_ because how could Kurt be mad at him, then not be willing to discuss why? How was that fair?

And maybe he hadn’t meant to be so violent during their fencing match, but then again, maybe he had.

The night was tired when Kurt cautiously opened up a door Blaine had given him the key too long ago.

“What was that earlier today? During combat class. Why are you so suddenly aggressive?”

“Maybe I just wanted to prove I was as strong as you are.”

And there it was, Pandora’s box opened, one question answered but so many more not-so pretty questions to be asked now, and so many not-so pretty answers to be given. And Blaine could see the pause in Kurt’s face, see the confusion as he asked what that meant, and so Blaine told him.

“I thought it would get better once we moved to New York City. I thought it would just be us, and we wouldn’t have distance separating us or Ohio trying to mess with us and we could be _free._ I - I thought once we’d achieved our dream everything would just be . . . perfect.”

“But it’s not”, Kurt adds softly.

“Yes, it’s not! And, and, if I’ve gotten everything I ever wanted, acceptance into my dream college, a wedding with you, all my dreams coming true and I’m still not happy, how will I ever be happy? Everything’s been going downhill since we moved here and it wasn’t supposed to, Kurt, it was supposed to be _perfect._ And I just, and I feel like there’s something I’m missing but I don’t know what it is. Like you, and Rachel, and Sam have all figured out the answer to this one question, and I don’t even know what the question is! And god I _hate_ myself for it -“

“Don’t say that.”

“But it’s true! I hate myself, I hate myself _so much_ , and if you looked closely you’d hate me too, I’ve been such a shitty fiancé and how will I ever manage to compare to him?”

“Compare to who? What are you talking about?”

“Compare to who you think I am! Who I used to be! I can’t compare to the guy you fell in love with, Kurt. The guy who swooped in and saved you from Karofsky, and who played the hero and who saved you like this, this prince coming in, because I’m not a prince anymore. I’m just a loser who clings to high school and who still hasn’t accepted the fact that I’ll never live up to the expectations I set for myself when I was fifteen, and you’re all popular and hot and it just feels like the whole balance has shifted!”

“What balance? We’re equals, Blaine. We’re each others better half.” Blaine could tell Kurt was getting frustrated now, could tell he’d said the wrong thing, but he pushed forward.

“But we’re not anymore! Your other half is a kid that could play pretend and that could protect you back when you needed protecting, and I’m, I’m not that kid anymore. We grew up, Kurt. And it isn’t the same. Because now look what happened a few weeks ago! The one time you need me to be there, the _one_ time I should’ve kept you safe and I should’ve protected you I _wasn’t there._ And it just feels like you don’t need me anymore. That you’ve grown up and grown more mature and I haven’t, and that one day you’ll realize you don’t love me anymore, and then what will I do? Because I love you more than everything else in this world combined, I need you to _survive,_ and Kurt, I don’t know how I’d live without you. I honestly don’t think I could.”

And the words hang in the air, almost as heavy as the two hearts, and Blaine doesn’t quite know what to say now that he let it all come pouring out. So he waits for Kurt to speak first. And Blaine knows he fucked everything up, that he ruined it all and just lost the one thing he was living for. He ruined it.

But then again, maybe he didn’t.


	6. Chapter 6

What are you supposed to say to something like that? How are you supposed to feel?

Maybe it was time Kurt stopped thinking about what he was supposed to do and started thinking about what he wanted to do. It was exhausting, having to be strong for both him and Blaine, and as much as he pretended he was fine, he wasn’t. He wasn’t okay. He was tired, and scared, and hurt, and . . . angry.

He was angry at whatever cosmic force kept throwing all these insane obstacles at him, year after year and never letting him catch a break. He was angry at the world for sitting back and letting him struggle until it affected them. He was angry at the people that had bullied him in a small school back in Ohio and he was angry at the people that had beaten him in a dark alley here in New York and he was angry with all the people that had made that possible.

And he was angry at Blaine, because the one time he was finally feeling good about himself Blaine had to go and make it about himself. And not only was it not enough for Blaine to at least act happy for his success, Blaine had to actually go and try to actively sabotage it like a fucking _child_ , and try to ruin Kurt’s happiness so that they could could be sad and lonely together like they were in high school.

Well you know what? Maybe Kurt doesn’t want high school anymore. Maybe he’s actually an adult now, and maybe he wants an adult relationship where they don’t blow up every time things get a little bit difficult, and maybe he’s realized that life isn’t a fairytale, it’s messy and real and complicated and fucking hard. Maybe Kurt’s realized that there’s no so such thing as heroes or people in need of rescuing in the real world, that everyone’s a little bit broken and a little bit strong and no one wants to be saved by someone once the glamour’s worn off.

And maybe it was time Blaine realized this too.

Maybe Kurt was tired of having to keep Blaine afloat when he himself was drowning. Maybe love is a two way street and maybe every time Blaine said Kurt was the only thing he was living for it was just more weight drowning him because Kurt was just a person. Kurt wasn’t a god. He was still trying to figure out how to navigate this world and knowing he was the only thing keeping Blaine from falling victim to himself was way too much pressure. No one should have to be the one person responsible for someone else. And Kurt hated saying things weren’t fair, because, well, life wasn’t fair, but this time he truly meant it.

And maybe all those thoughts in his head weren’t quite as quiet as he thought they were, because Blaine was looking up at him with stricken eyes and Kurt realized he had been thinking out loud. Desperately trying to figure out what exactly he said during that torrential of messy thoughts escaping his mouth when they weren’t supposed to, but the look on Blaine’s face told him he had said enough. A scolded puppy dog with wide ashamed eyes, and not for the first time Kurt wished Blaine would roll his eyes, or say a sarcastic comment, or do anything except stare at Kurt like _he_ was the bad guy, because he _wasn’t_ and Blaine had no right to make him feel guilty over saying the truth.

“You’re breaking up with me.” The tone was resigned, not a question but a fact, a dull acceptance of what was to come.

And for a second, the thought crossed his mind. For a second Kurt wondered what this meant, wondered if this really was what he wanted. But Kurt shut that thought out of his mind, he padlocked it away and threw out the key and refused to acknowledge it until the heart thumping from beneath floorboards got too loud for him to ignore. But that wouldn’t be for a while.

Because the second Kurt contemplated it, the realization hit him like a train. He loved Blaine. So much. He loved all of him, and he would keep loving him through all those messy fights and all those petty arguments because he was messy too, and they could be messy together. And every moment of difficulty side by side with Blaine would be a million times better than apart.

“Blaine, calm down. I’m not breaking up with you. I love you, I love all your perfect imperfections even if you can’t love them yourself. And I swear to god I’m not leaving you. But you have to stop panicking and, and, thinking that I am because then you put that on _me,_ okay? Because then you put your issues on me and make me deal with them and that’s just going to make everything fall apart.”

“Okay.”

A pause and then; “I’m sorry, Kurt. I really truly am. I’m sorry for trying to hurt you and I’m sorry for hurting you. I’m so sorry.”

And Kurt could tell he meant it, could tell he did feel guilty and genuinely was sorry. But maybe sorries start to lose their impact when there’s just so many of them.

“It’s okay, Blaine. I’m okay.”

“No, you’re not! You have to stop pretending it’s alright, because you’re not.”

“I’m . . . “

And maybe Blaine was right. Maybe he was’t okay at all. Maybe he was -

“. . . scared. I’m scared, Blaine. I’m scared because I have no idea what’s coming and I hate not knowing that. And we keep almost falling apart and the idea that this might not last forever terrifies me. And I’m scared because I love order and control and you make me not want any of those things and I’m still not sure how I feel about that. And - and I’m scared because I don’t know how a relationship is supposed to work when two people are as fucked up as we are.”

Kurt felt the tears rise up from his throat and he felt Blaine wrap his arms around him, and he let go and felt the tears flow freely, crying into Blaine’s shoulder and surrounding himself with the familiar scent of raspberry hair gel.

“I’m scared that something like that might happen again, and it’ll be worse, or maybe it’ll happen to you instead and maybe, maybe . . .”

He didn’t finish the sentence because there were some fears that couldn’t be said out loud, but Blaine knew what he meant, because his eyes were red and his cheeks were wet too.

“And I know it’s stupid, but I just felt so weak because I let them get to me, and I let them get away, and I let all of this happen-

“Kurt, Kurt. It’s not your fault. None of this is your fault. Look, you, you went and you charged right into danger to save them. That’s _brave_ , Kurt. You didn’t run.”

The words Blaine didn’t say were implied; “Like I did.” And Kurt remembered Blaine had been in his place too, and god how had he forgotten that?

“I know how it feels. Like how the entire world feels against you and how you feel weak and small and alone but you’re _not_ alone Kurt. You have Rachel, and you have Mercedes, and you have your Dad and Carol and I promise they are all so, _so_ , proud of you. And even if he’s not here with you you have Finn, and I know for a fact he loved you and he was proud of you and he still is, wherever he is.”

Blaine’s voice cracked a little at this, and Kurt could feel his heart cracking too.

“And you have me, and while I can’t promise I won’t accidentally hurt you, I swear to god I will _never_ try to hurt you again. And I can’t promise nothing like what happened to you will happen again, but I can promise that if it does we’ll be able to get through it together and we’ll come out stronger. Because you’re brave Kurt. You’re the bravest person I’ve ever known and you make me feel brave too.”

And Kurt wanted to reach over and wipe away the tears balancing on dark lashes, but he didn’t because they were beautiful in their own way too. And when he spoke, his voice was raw and painful.

“Look, Blaine. You’re not perfect. You never will be. And that’s okay, because neither am I. And I don’t think I would love you the same if you were, because there’s nothing beautiful about perfection.”

And he wondered for a moment if he was saying that to convince Blaine, or to convince himself.

“And I love every part of you, and I promise I’ll never stop. And though I can’t promise this’ll last forever, because nothing lasts forever no matter how strong and pure it is, I can promise that I’ll never let it fade away. Because I love you and I love what we have.”

And together they got tangled in love’s twisted embrace, letting the tears mix together. And as the April rain beat down against the loft’s window, they got swept up with familiar rhythms and soft touches and whispered promises and the knowledge that this city, this world, was broken and never would quite heal. But that was alright, because the beauty lay in the realness of it all. And they let themselves accept that theyweren’t perfect, they were both broken in their own ways.

But at least they could be broken together.


End file.
